My first bungee jump

This week Google Photos app pleasantly reminded me of some wonderful trips I had 10 years back in South Korea. During this visit to South Korea I made some good friends and had quite a few good trips near and around Suwon city. And now when I sit back reminiscing all the good moments from this trip I realized I haven't written any posts unfortunately in this blog about these trips. I can only reason out to my hectic workload during weekdays and busy wandering during weekends.

Today the app brought up a photo of my 1st bungee jump. Boy!, that was one helluva experience. Even today I distinctly remember the whole series of events that unfolded on that day. So I decided to pen it down now.

Winters are real cold in Suwon, South Korea with good amount of snow and -ve temperatures, but that didn't deter me and my friends from visiting places of attraction. Back then it wasn't so easy getting information about places of attraction or about commutation details; we didn't have present day websites/apps/services and English translated data was rarely found. However, we got necessary information about a place called Nami Island from our Korean colleagues and decided to visit one fine weekend. I remember the journey included a bus journey for few hours and a taxi ride, not forgetting the funny interactions & help taken from local Koreans who helped us with directions & all despite not knowing English.

I along with my 3 friends reached this place on that cold afternoon. We had to take a ferry to reach the main island. It was a beautiful place full of trees, water all around, perhaps a great place for a summer getaway.
We spent couple of hours roaming around and then started back. On our way back, I saw a huge board advertising "Korea's highest bungee jump". I instantly decided to go for it despite the fact we were getting late for our return journey. One couple in the group said 'No' downright and the other girl, though willing, couldn't gather enough courage to join me.

I remember, there was a group of 4-5 Korean boys along with me at the top of the tower, which was ~55 meters high, waiting for the organizers to set up things for the jumps. In fact, I also recollect the boys discussing with me about Mahatma Gandhi & other Indian aspects once they came to know I'm an Indian. They, as a matter of fact, pushed me to the front of the queue. Couldn't know whether it was a sign of respect for a foreigner or yanking my chain😛

There was I, standing at the edge of the deck looking down at the water, wondering "What the hell am I doing?!". I was confident when I took the stairs to the top, while talking to those folks and when I'm about to jump I'm shit scared. I could hear my heart pounding. It was cold and dark already. I hear those boys having a good laugh about my situation. And to make things worse, I see this guy who was tightening my rope & harness innocently asking, 'Do I have to push you?' seeing me little tensed. I politely declined his offer and decided to gather all my courage and take that one awesome jump 😃
It was so exhilarating that I started howling when I jumped. It was one heck of an experience which is so very difficult to forget.

I'm happy to share this video where I'm being taken off to safety after the jump in a boat.

[I can feel my heart beating faster right now while I am writing this 😁. Just imagine, it's been a decade since I did this crazy stuff and I still *FEEL* it]

My other friend was so envious seeing me so happy & excited about the whole experience, and later regretted not joining me. I simply couldn't take that smile off my face the whole journey back home. There was a sense of accomplishment and pride in it. I cherish it even today.

Sakleshpur outing

After going through a list of getaways around Bengaluru & lot of discussion, my friends and I decided to visit Sakleshpur in Hassan district of Karnataka over the weekend. We booked Kaduhithlu homestay/resort. This place is around 6 hours  from Bengaluru. We started at dawn and reached the resort during lunch time, after stopping in between for breakfast and tender coconut.

The resort is situated in the middle of greenery with a nice view of mountains next to it. We were greeted with delicious lunch immediately. It has a nice play area where we and kids enjoyed playing volleyball, cricket and football. There is a hut kinda sit-out which served as the ideal place for our quiz games and discussions. Campfire at night in that breezy cool weather was something which everyone enjoyed.

The best part of this place was there is no cellular network. So, all we could do with our phones is taking photos and playing music. Just imagine, all friends sitting around and nobody checking any social networking apps or messaging apps, complete attention in the middle and everybody totally involved in the talks or games or with kids. Bliss!
Hope this place remains that way with no network, and I forgot to ask how the owners managed w.r.t inquiries and bookings. There is downside to it but I guess, the whole point of getaways like these is that you have total fun away from all your chores, including your mobile screen time.

PC: Varsha ;-)

One other good thing is the arranged trek/hike to nearby Saalugudda hill. This is about an hour, easy trek which anyone can enjoy, including 6+ years kids. If parents are fit enough to carry kids who are < 6 years old and those who can't walk for long, can even think of going. I trekked this hill twice i.e. on a Saturday morning and Sunday morning as well. First one with friends which gave a proper estimate of the trek which apparently helped me decide to take my wife and 6 year old son the next day. This was my son's first trek and I was delighted. He was excited walking in the dense trees and reaching the top, however his energy faded towards the end as he got little tired :)

The hilltop gives a nice view of the sunrise and also of the surrounding areas, including the resort top view. In fact, people at the resort could see us when we were at the top.

• A nice sports shoes should be enough for this trek, especially for kids. Even crocs or floaters are ok for grownups.
• Carry a backpack with water and some snacks.

So, in all a nice weekend retreat and one of our best outings so far.

Unforgettable trip

It so often happens, we tend to look far beyond only to miss out on the things near us. I realized recently that I have not taken time to visit some beautiful nearby places which I have read about in my history books and despite hearing wonderful things since my childhood, I haven't been there yet. So I decided to visit most of these places, if not all, which are quite near to my hometown, Hubballi in Karnataka.

During the Christmas vacation, I got this wonderful opportunity to visit these places of historical importance.

Badami:

Badami, which is ~100 kms from my hometown, was the first place and is very well known for its cave temples. The cave temples date back to around 4th century when Chaulukyas ruled and have many sculputres of Lord Shiva, Lord Vishnu and Jain Thirthankaras. The caves are situated next to the Agastya lake. There is another beautiful temple, Bhootnath temple next to this lake and I was amazed by the art work and the great effort put in to have temples like these ready and that too during the 4th century timeframe.

Pattadakalla:

I drove to Pattadakalla which is just ~21 kms from Badami and is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. All the temples and monuments are situated at a single site and display stories from Ramayana and Mahabharata. This too dates back to the Chalukya dynasty.

Aihole:

From there I drove to the next town Aihole which is ~14 kms from Pattadakalla. There are many temples dedicated to Lord Shiva, Vishnu, Durga along with Jain temples in the vicinity. The Jain temple on the Meguti hill was a beautiful site providing full view of the town. All the nearby temples and museum are quite visible from this place. The sites are surrounded by farms and villages due to which it might not seem posh clean. Having said that, all the temples and sites are kept in best conditions. In fact, I was surprised by seeing the cleaniness maintained in all the sites at Badami, Pattadakalla and Aihole.

Kudalasangama:

I decided to head towards Kudala Sangama which is an important center for Lingayats community. This place holds great importance as this is the Aikya mantapa of Basavanna, the founder of the Lingayats, and also due to the presense of swayambhu Linga. It was late night when I reached there and hence decided to search for a guest-house nearby. I had nice dinner at Kamat yatrinivas and stayed at Jain yatrinivas which are quite close by to the main temple.
Early morning I got ready and visited the Sangameshwara temple followed by the Linga dharshana. The confluence of Krishna and Malaprabha rivers was a nice sight to witness.

Hampi:

Immediately after breakfast, I headed to my next destination, Hampi, again a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Hampi is ~140 kms and I reached there in 2 1/2 hours. Couple of days back I had found that my friends Abhishek and Mahesh from my previous himalayan trek were also planning to visit Hampi. I got in touch with them and decided to roam around Hampi together. On reaching, we hired a local guide who took us around explaining the history and stories associated with the place, about Vijayanagara empire, the kings and etc.

The Vittala temple & market complex, Hazara Ram temple, Lotus Mahal, Elephant stables and Virupaksha temple were the few places we were able to visit in the given limited time. The Hampi experience was enriching, witnessing the grandour of the kingdown, the complexity of the temples and the minute artwork in each of them was amazing.

This was surely one of the satisfying trips I had in recent past and I'm sure I will visit these places again in near future to cover all the temples and monuments which I missed in this trip.

Himalayas 2017: Kasol & nearby places

It was that time of the year when the Himalayan Expeditions are at full swing and I along with my friends, who had met during my trek to Khaliya Top last year, decided to trek one more Himalayan mountain. And we finalized on the Chandrakhani trek in Himachal Pradesh this time. My friends suggested to roam around nearby places before starting the trek so we planned our itinerary accordingly: Reach Kasol two days in advance and explore Kasol & nearby places and then head towards the base camp i.e. Ramsu village for the trek.

I will organize my trek experience details into two posts i.e. this one describing the Kasol and neighborhood and followed by other one describing the actual trek.

Delhi:

The trip started at Delhi where we all met. 5 friends from Mumbai, couple of them from Vadodara and myself from Bengaluru. We had few hours to spend and I took the group to Paranthe gali, Chandni Chowk for lunch and then followed by a stroll at Red Fort. Metro in Delhi is quite convenient and remember to take the Smart card for easy commutation.

We took a HP tourism bus from Delhi to Manali and got down at Bhuntar to reach Kasol. The bus dropped us at Bhuntar in the early hours and then we took another local bus to Kasol. Kasol is base camp for other treks like Sarpass, so there were many other trekkers in the bus along with school kids and locals. I made my group get down one stop earlier to the actual stop near to our hotel where we had booked our rooms. And I made them walk for extra 2.5 KMs with their bags and I am sure hitting me would have crossed their minds :-p. We stayed at Royal Palace and had a very comfortable and pleasant stay. The hotel is situated right in between Kasol and Manikaran, the two famous tourist places around.

Manikaran:

We headed towards Manikaran immediately after getting ready. There are some nice temples at this place where we spent enough time taking photos. We went near the gurudwara, hot springs spot as well and then passed through the local market. The bridge was also a nice spot to click some snaps.

Kasol:

We walked back and then proceeded toward the Kasol market, a full 5 KMs stretch. The market had similar products as what was seen in Manikaran but costlier. And we were surprised to see so many items being sold related to smoking, the hukkas and mixers. Hope you got what I mean ;-)

Food at local places was great. And then we headed back to the hotel calling it a day.

I got up early the next morning for a run in that pleasant weather. And one of my friend ventured out for early morning clicks in the wild. I ran towards Kasol and reached the other end where Youth Hostel Association of India has set up its Sarpass trek base camp. On the way back, I got down the river side and experienced the joy of standing bare feet in that ice cold water. It was a torture as well, as it's difficult to stand for even a minute in that cold water.

Malana:

Malana village and Tosh were couple of places to be explored and based on our hotel manager's suggestion, we headed towards Malana village in two taxis. Reached the spot in about two hours’ time and there was still a walk/trek of 90 minutes further to reach the village. It's a small village at a good height. Locals claim it to be one of the oldest democracies and if the legends are to be believed, these are the descendants of army men (Aryan?) who made this place their home. This place is also famous for high purity hash, Malana cream ;-), if you are interested to know.

There is a glacier nearby which we couldn't visit due to time constraints and tiredness. We returned to hotel and ended the day with some great fun playing cards.

Parashar Lake:

The next morning the plan was to visit a place called Parashar Lake, Mandi. This place is famous for its location and landscape. And boy! it was beautiful and peaceful, away from all the crowd and chaos. The temple next to the Parashar Lake is situated at the top of a mountain surrounded by bigger mountains and believe me, it was worth the time and effort.

We reached this place after a strenuous 4 hours’ journey from Kasol through Bhuntar and the road was bumpy if not terrible. Came back to Bhuntar from where we headed straight to the Ramsu village, our base camp hiring one more taxi through Manali.

P.S: Read my trek experience here.

Trip to Mahabaleshwar

Long weekend was here due to Labor's day and we decided to visit Mahabaleshwar. It's a hill station in Maharashtra in the Sahyadri range and a well known weekend getaway. My wife and my in-laws have visited this place on many occasions before and it was kinda long overdue for me.

Mahabaleshwar is a small town with few tourist attractions and a very pleasant weather that makes it an awesome place to visit, especially during summers. I personally didn't visit these high altitude viewing points, which are considered the main attractions. However, I spent most of the time strolling around the market area and nearby places in the center of the town.

The market street has many shops selling shoes, sandals, dresses, different flavors of sweets and chocolates, juices, fruits, leather items and many more. There is something inexplicable about these markets; people tend to switch to shopping mood quite easily, even if they hadn't really planned for before coming to the place.

The best thing I could buy is a box of strawberries. These were super fresh and sweet. I don't think I had so many strawberries at a stretch in my life before. Please don't forget to buy if you happen to visit this place. Later, I found that Mahabaleshwar accounts for about 80% of strawberries productions in the country. That certainly is huge.
And BTW, I almost forgot to mention, despite a big crowd swamping in throughout the year, this town is super clean and tidy. There's a multi-level parking lot near the market place as well to ease the parking problem.

Horse riding is another attraction and this is what my kiddo enjoyed the most apart from the swimming at the hotel pool. He's little afraid of water, rather was, due to his swimming teacher's ironic act of pushing him into water to take away his fear of water. After first days swimming where I taught him how to paddle his hands and legs using a tube around him, he got quite used to the technique and started enjoying. Second day morning the first thing he said after waking up was - 'Lets go for a swim'. :)
He has been here before couple of times and he enjoys it totally.

We visited a nearby Mapro graden where we get many fruit products such as juices, squashes, chocolates etc. To make the selection process easy, they have many counters providing juice samples. Make sure to buy what you really need as it's quite easy to get carried away by the choices :)

Tour Down Under: Sydney

Following up with my previous post on Melbourne trip, here is the post covering all the details of my Sydney trip.

Sydney has some great attractions and is a bigger city when compared to Melbourne city. I just had a weekend to visit all the places in Sydney and well, thanks to my sister & brother-in-law who introduced me to a nice couple, Sachin & Varsha, who made our visit a great one with their warmth and time. They made sure that we made it to all the great places in Sydney. Many thanks to them as well.

Here is the list of places where we set our foot on:

Sydney Harbour Bridge: This undoubtedly takes the top spot on tourists' list of must-visit places in Australia. This steel arch bridge next to symbolic Sydney Opera house gives a magnificent view of the city. The long walk on the bridge was a satisfying activity indeed. One can even take a walk to the top of the arch on the bridge by pre-booking and I'm sure it wouldn't disappoint anyone.

Pylon lookout: This lookout from the Harbour bridge is a nice spot to witness the beautiful view of the whole area around the bridge. The Opera House looks great with all the boats and ferries running near by. This deck houses all the details of the bridge from it's very beginning to it's opening ceremony covering all the aspects on the arguments of whether to have a bridge, the tenders received with different design aspects, the construction details and even all the historical events which happened during and after the construction. A small movie/presentation on the history is also being played for the public.

Below Opera House snap is clicked from this Pylon lookout.

Sydney Opera House: This is the most famous building and also a World Heritage Site. This is actually an iconic arts center which has multiple venues. One of the busiest places and even entertains crowd with plays and dances in the open area during weekends.

Just next to the Opera House is the Botanical Gardens where I had a nice train ride which took around half an hour and it was my kiddo who enjoyed it more than me.

Darling Harbour: This is a harbour next to the city center of Sydney consists of many attractions in the area which includes Madame Tussauds, China town, Cockle bay, Wharfs etc. I spent most of the time on the bay area through the Pyrmont bridge. The fireworks show in the night sky with skyscrapers background was a delight to the eyes.

Ferry ride to Manly Beach: I took a ferry from Circular Quay to the Manly beach. This provides a great view of the Opera House, Harbour Bridge and surrounding places. There wasn't much of an activity unfortunately during my visit at the beach as the weather was cold and windy. But nonetheless, the walk to the Manly beach through the busy market street was nice and a small play area there gave my kiddo time to enjoy with other kids.

Bondi Beach: The popular beach is one of the most visited sites in Sydney. Also represents sports and recreational center. The beach is beautiful with it's curved area and is always full of activities like surfing etc. I'm told the walk towards Coogee is impressive providing the best scenes of the water vastness.

Blues point & Milson's point: Give a visit to these points during late night and witness spectacular view of the Harbour bridge and the Opera House glowing in the dark background. The city lights adds to the beautiful sight.

The above Harbour bridge snap is taken from Blues point.

Watson Bay: This bay is worth a visit for it's serene environment. The Gap Buff viewing platform on the way is a nice place to take a snap or two.

Bald Hill Reserve: A great lookout spot to have a beautiful panoramic view of the sea and beyond. The elevated height is an added advantage. Also a great site for the paragliding enthusiasts. Again, the cold and windy weather did not encourage me to have a try at the paragliding unfortunately.

On the way back, passed through Coalcliff and Sea cliff bridges which were quite a serene places to spend sometime.

The central city area covering primary places of visit are easily accessible through well connected metro.

Tour Down Under: Melbourne

In the month of August I was reminded of my son's 2 weeks Dasara festival holidays between Oct 1st to 13th. That's when my wife and I started planning for a visit to Australia which was long overdue. My sister and brother-in-law who stay in Melbourne have been always asking us to take a trip but that hadn't materialized so far. So after discussing with my sister we decided to spend 2 weeks in Australia covering Melbourne and Sydney.

And now when I'm back from this wonderful vacation, I would like to list down all the places I've visited, the restaurants I've been to, and other activities I enjoyed.

I will begin with the vibrant city, Melbourne in this post and follow up with another post for Sydney.

Melbourne Cricket Ground: One of the largest stadiums in the world is the home for the Melbourne Cricket Club. It features great history of the game of Cricket. Also there is a Sports Museum inside which covers and highlights the great sports culture of Australia. A guided tour of the stadium and Sports museum visit will make any sports enthusiast happy.

Federation Square: Just outside the beautiful Flinder's station, Federation square is a happening place always full of tourists and is surrounded by restaurants and bars. This hosts many cultural events and also a best venue for flashmobs.
Continue ahead from the square to have a nice walk next to Yarra river. You will find this route full of cafes and bars. Even the joggers and cyclists make use of this route.

State Library of Victoria: The central library sees huge number of tourists every year for its architectural aspect, historical importance and for the historical, art artifacts it holds. The dome area in the library is a great sight with its octagonal design for reading tables surrounded by thousands of books. Many themed exhibits are always on offer. Front yard even entertains people with big chess game on each sides.

Shrine of Remembrance: This was built as a memorial to all the Australia's men and women who served in World War 1. It captures all the details about the wars and the great contribution of Australians. 

Eureka Skydeck 88: This 297 meters building which has an observatory deck on the 88th floor gives an awesome view of the whole Melbourne city and beyond in all directions. It even holds the Australia's highest post box.

Queen Victoria Market: The market is a very big open market having shops selling wide variety of Australia's well known items including the souvenirs. And also has many restaurants and food stores serving great food. A nice place to grab some items from your shopping list.

12 Apostles & Great Ocean Drive: The 12 Apostles are the limestone stacks standing off the shore of Port Campbell by Great Ocean Road. The view is impressive along the vast coast. Nearby Gibson's point and Lock Ard area are equally scenic. I enjoyed driving as well while returning from this place.

City Circle Tram: This is a free tram which runs covering all the major tourist attractions in the city. Take a nice audio guided tour on this tram to get first hand information of the attractions and location which helps to roam better.

Degraves Street, Lygon Street and Hardware Lane: These narrow lanes have many cafes, bars and restaurants serving wonderful drinks and different cuisines. I had great Italian food at Triim restaurant and Chinese food in Degraves street.

Brunetti Shops: If you love sweet then this is a place you better not miss. The shop serves some great pastries, chocolates and coffee.

Melbourne Zoo and SeaLife Aquarium: Nice places to visit especially for kids as they would enjoy all the animals and sea creatures including those which are Australian specific. The SeaLife Aquarium also has a nice play area where kids paint some fishes on templates provided which can be scanned further and displayed on a big animation screen. Kids enjoyed this activity.

Melbourne Central Station and Flinders Station are worth mentioning as they are quite well known destinations for tourists. Central station is a great place for shopping as well and features colorful atmosphere with all shops and restaurant.
Docklands is worth a visit where one can have a peaceful stroll and can enjoy time sitting in any of the cafes or bars.
Bourke Street: Every great city has a street where many music bands, singers, guitarists and street showman show up and entertain the crowd. Fridays and Weekends are the right time to visit this street to enjoy what's in the offering.
This was even decorated with Diwali festival banners to indicate the acceptance of different ethnic groups.

Points to note:
- The metro in the city is well connected and covers most of the above mentioned places and to bring joy to the tourists, the bus ride is absolutely free in the central city area (Zone 1).
- Melbourne Metro app would be really handy while roaming around the city.
- Pickup a tourist booklet at the airport after landing which gives all the information about the attractions and also contains discount coupons.

Dally in Delhi

On the way to my trekking destination this year to Uttarakhand, I had the opportunity to spend some time in the capital. And I made sure to visit those places which I had missed during my previous visit many years ago.

India Gate was the first in the list. I got down at the Central secretariat metro station and was told by a passerby on inquiry that I have to walk through couple of gardens to reach the India Gate. And I did just what was told. After walking some distance through the lawns crossing the Janpath and Man Singh roads, I was in front of the war memorial to the soldiers who died during First World War. Below words are inscribed on the monument:

TO THE DEAD OF THE INDIAN ARMIES WHO FELL HONOURED IN FRANCE AND FLANDERS MESOPOTAMIA AND PERSIA EAST AFRICA GALLIPOLI AND ELSEWHERE IN THE NEAR AND THE FAR-EAST AND IN SACRED MEMORY ALSO OF THOSE WHOSE NAMES ARE RECORDED AND WHO FELL IN INDIA OR THE NORTH-WEST FRONTIER AND DURING THE THIRD AFGHAN WAR

Spent sometime around the memorial and then proceeded towards the Rashtrapati Bhavan in the same route I had come but further ahead after crossing the Central secretariat station. The Parliment house, North and South Block on the way made the walk interesting as if I'm watching any news channel on TV. In fact, met many reporters and news crew in front of the Parliment house. Of course, the innumerable vehicles with red beacons, Govt. number plates made quite an impression.

Later, I proceeded towards Red Fort. I noticed it was the right time for the 'Light and Sound' show. I took the ticket and started walking towards the show area through the security check. What I witnessed next left me flabbergasted. All the visitors were welcomed with mosquito repellent, Odomos. I mean it! Though I noticed the entrance was full of mosquitoes in the evening, I was taken aback by the sight of officials distributing the repellent. Instead of finding a solution for the problem, management here has decided to ask visitors to apply repellent. I reached the main seating area of the show, and one more official standing there with Odomos. This was certainly an indication of how serious the mosquito problem was. Honestly, I had never seen before those many mosquitoes  interested in the 'Light and Sound' show!
Anyways, despite covering myself with a cap and pull-over, I couldn't let myself take the punishment of sitting there for more than 10 minutes after the show began. I walked out.

 
Disappointed by the state of matters at the historical place of India, I decided to visit the Jain temple situated opposite to the Red Fort. Seeing so many Jains praying, singing and chanting with diyas in hand was quite a scene.
The plan was to have dinner at nearby Parathe Wali Gali and proceed towards the Delhi railway station. Had sumptuous dinner at the Parathe Wala with those interesting and tasty variety of Paranthas.

Well, all this was during my onward journey and while finally returning from my trek, I got another half a day at Delhi. I decided to visit the famous Akshardham. The temple with it's architectural work, the sandstone and marble carved pillars and everything else at the venue left me spellbound. One great move by the management there was to ban taking of mobile devices and cameras inside the temple. This leaves the place serene with no disturbances from those who go crazy taking snaps around ;-)
Befriended an Ukranian, Alex while standing in the queue. Enjoyed the mandir view and had fun chatting on many topics as well which included war, country traditions, food habits, job, interests and marriage.

I have to finish off saying that I indeed had a nice time roaming around Delhi lanes.

Khaliya Top, Himalayan Expedition 2016

It seemed a very long time since my previous Himalayan trek to Sarpaas so I decided to plan for my next one. As April-May is the time when Youth Hostels Association of India gets ready for expeditions, I checked out various treks offered and finalized on the Khaliya Top in Uttarakhand, India, mainly for two reasons: a. 7 days trek suits my available leaves ;-) b. This is in a state which I've not visited before.
I registered for this trek in the month of March with May 7th as the reporting date keeping in mind a Sunday for rest after my return. And that gave me enough time to plan and book the tickets to the base camp, Munsiyari in Pithoragarh district of Uttarakhand. Flight from Bengaluru to Delhi, followed by an overnight train from Delhi to nearest railway station, Kathgodam. And finally a 12 hour bus journey to Munsiyari. Well, this bus journey turned out to be a tedious and frustrating part of the whole trip. Matter of 275 kms and takes ~12 hours due to the mountain ghat sections. 

Day 1: After the overnight train journey, the complimentary tempo ride was ready just outside the station. In no time all of us heading towards Munsiyari gathered at the tempo as per the instructions and started the journey towards the base camp. Little did we know that we will be forced to listen to some local songs being played in the tempo which made the journey more torturous :) Finally reached the base camp with couple of pit stops in the middle for breakfast and lunch. I was surprised to see a makeshift hotel to be our base camp (7200 ft) instead of typical YHAI camp with tents. Nonetheless a good surprise ;-)

Day 2: This was a acclimatization day and a morning walk to nearby mountain was scheduled. Basic exercises and couple of yoga aasanas were performed. Nice serene place to start off frankly.

After the breakfast, we were taken to a nearby uphill to tune us for coming days. At the top, beautifully constructed Gayatri temple awaited us. We all were invited inside the temple as it started raining where the camp leader decided to provide the whole expedition orientation and also select the group leader and environment leader. I nominated myself for the group leader position and was accepted due to my previous YHAI trek experience to Sarpaas. The group of 32 introduced themselves and it was really nice to meet people from different regions of India who are into different domains of occupation. We had among us a professional guide, doctor, bank official, professional photographer, sound engineer, NGO member, YHAI regional representatives, professors, advocates and many others including a 12 years old boy with his family.
The evening was well spent playing card games on the terrace in the cold weather.

Day 3: This was the day when we started to higher camps. We set out with our packed lunch boxes towards higher altitudes. After few hours of steep walk in the wood, we reached a pleasant place and decided to have our lunch enjoying the scene.

We had a tough 12 kms trek before we reached our first higher camp, Martholi Thatch at a height of 8500 ft, welcomed by camp leader, Manoj Kumar Sahu. 

 Everyone enjoyed the remaining of the day with a game of Frisbee until rain God entered the scene. It rained heavily in the late evening and to add to the excitement, water started entering our tents. Initially it was little scary but later we decided to just ignore the rain, the water, the tent and start the game of playing cards :) 10 of us in our tent played for more than an hour when eventually rain stopped. We stepped out to make a note of the damage. It was very cold and completely dark with no signs of electricity anywhere close to us. We called it a day to have the much needed sleep. Woke up early at 5am to enjoy the sunrise and the beautiful mountains.

Day 4: Again, we packed our lunch boxes and headed towards our next camp. We walked a good stretch in the mountains with quite a few water streams on the way. We had to increase our pace thanks to the drizzle. We reached the next camp, Roodkhan (9000 ft) greeted by camp leader, Rajiv Narvekar. The day followed again with a game of Frisbee, singing and a game of Mafia. Forgot to mention that we had a Radio(Doordarshan?) artist amongst us. A singer and a dancer who entertained us with nice classical songs. Others too accompanied with Hindi/Marathi songs.
It rained again for sometime and fortunately no leaks in tents this time. Hailstones actually which made the atmosphere more exciting.

Day 5: The next days trek was again quite steep with beautiful valleys with mist and clouds. Few of the members spotted rabbits and rare birds before reaching the next camp, Tanti (~12000 ft). On our way we had reached the maximum height of the trek of ~13000 ft. This camp was surrounded by rocky mountains and a small pond next to it. It was quite chilly and intense so we remained inside the tents playing cards and mafia until our camp leader reminded us of time and asked us to sleep.

Day 6: This was the day when we started towards the Khaliya Top. After few hours of ups and downs we reached a beautiful lush green plain with sheep around. The sky was not clear most of the time but provided us clear picture in between and that's when the whole group enjoyed photo shooting and other fun activities. One of the elite member came up with a crazy idea of taking off the shirts for the photo shoot. Most of the boys were hesitant initially but immediately went with the wind and enjoyed the act ;-) Frankly, it came out real good and everybody had a good laugh.

We continued further down for another 8 kms towards the base camp. The stone pathway created more problem as it was harder on our knees. Nonetheless a wonderful trek coming to an end. At the base camp the Field leader Vivek Kholey greeted us inside. 

I had this wonderful opportunity to visit a nice place and in the process met some fine people who were simply a great company. These new friends made the trek more enjoyable and something special to remember for many years to come.